Engineering interaction-induced topological insulators in a 3 × 3 substrate-induced honeycomb superlattice
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Contributors
Abstract
We consider a system of spinless fermions on the honeycomb lattice with substrate-induced modulated electrostatic potentials tripling the unit cell. The resulting non-Abelian SU(2) gauge fields act cooperatively to realize a quadratic band crossing point (QBCP). Using a combination of mean-field theory and renormalization group techniques, we show that in the QBCP regime, arbitrarily weak repulsive electronic interactions drive the system into the quantum anomalous Hall state. This proves that substrate-induced local voltages are an effective knob to induce the spontaneous formation of a topological quantum phase.
Details
Original language | English |
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Article number | 045428 |
Journal | Physical Review B |
Volume | 93 |
Issue number | 4 |
Publication status | Published - 27 Jan 2016 |
Peer-reviewed | Yes |